MidnighTreats is going to bring its monster-sized, vegan cookies to Reston Town Center.
The homegrown business will move from its original Reston storefront in Plaza America to a currently vacant space at 1826 Discovery Street next to Playa Bowls, possibly late next spring, according to MidnighTreats owner and founder Johnny Nguyen, who said late last week that the deal “was just finalized.”
“Since the permitting process is so long, we can’t say an opening day yet but hope to launch by May 2025 and will have exciting promotions going on our opening weekend,” he told FFXnow by email.
The planned relocation was first reported by The Burn.
At 619 square feet, the new space is less than half the size of MidnighTreats’ current location in Plaza America, where it occupies 1,395 square feet on the ground floor of an office building, per an occupancy permit.
However, the Plaza America store is removed from the main retail strip, so it gets no foot traffic and mostly supports deliveries, Nguyen says. By contrast, the new location is central in Reston Town Center, adjacent to the RTC guest center and opening onto the Fountain Square pavilion.
According to Nguyen, MidnighTreats chose the Plaza America spot for its first store because as a new startup just making the pivot from a home-based business to the brick-and-mortar world, it didn’t have the budget to afford the rent and build-out at most locations.
After establishing the business in 2018 by baking cookies in his mother’s kitchen in Vienna, Nguyen moved operations to a commercial kitchen in Chantilly before opening at Plaza America on May 27, 2022.
“Now we’ve spent the past couple of years growing the business and we’re lucky enough to get the opportunity to join the Reston Town Center,” Nguyen said. “Going from our current location where you need to have a GPS to find us to a town center that has hundreds of visitors a day is a major win for us!”
MidnighTreats sells six flavors of cookie at any given time. At the moment, the seasonally appropriate gingerbread and peppermint bark are on offer, in addition to the usual chocolate chip, brownie cookie, birthday bash and cinna-roll.
For now, the shop remains open at Plaza America from 1-10 p.m. on weekdays and from noon to 10 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday. Other locations can be found in Old Town Alexandria and at Ballston Quarter in Arlington.
A Vienna bakery closed on Sept. 7 — the same day as the opening in Arlington — after the business adapted its retail strategy to prioritize “high foot traffic centers,” Nguyen told FFXnow at the time.
Once MidnighTreat bounces to Reston Town Center, Plaza America visitors will still be able to obtain giant cookies from Crumbl Cookies, which opened at the shopping center in March 2022.
